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Google is giving away 15,000 pairs of solar eclipse glasses to schools across the US

Doug Peltz
has been looking forward to
the August 21 solar eclipse since he was 8 years old, so he
knows what it's like to be a young kid that wants to be
amazed.

That's why Peltz, cofounder and CCO of the
science-education company Mystery Science, along with his
partner and CEO Keith Schacht, are working with Google to give
away 15,000 glasses to schools around the US in the coming
weeks.

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As long as a school can confirm that at
least 200 kids will be watching the eclipse, Mystery Science
will ship a box of glasses free of charge.

The partnership is part of
Google's larger mission to equip every child in America with
a pair of eclipse glasses. The tech giant has promised to ship
some 2 million glasses to 4,800 public libraries across the US,
all in the hopes that as many kids as possible will get to see
the moon crossing directly in front of the sun.

A total solar eclipse hasn't crossed the US since 1918, and
it won't happen again until 2045.

"Going to the moon, exploring the surface of Mars, or
seeing a total solar eclipse across the US for the first time in
a century are amazing moments that can inspire a whole new
generation of explorers and scientists," Calvin Johnson, Program
Manager at Google, said in a
press statement.

Similar to regular sunglasses, eclipse glasses block out
intense solar light - just to a greater degree. They also tend to
be made with special filters that preserve the color of the sun
so viewers can more easily distinguish between the moon and the
sun's outer ring, or corona.

The eclipse will be visible to everyone in the continental
United States, but will only be a total eclipse - meaning, the
moon passes directly in front of the sun - for people in a
specific path the sun will carve from the northwestern states
down through the southeast. The further people are from that
line, the more off-center the moon will appear in front of the
sun.

Teachers can use the website Eclipse
America to look up when, where, and how the eclipse will
appear near their school.

Experts predict the eclipse is expected to begin around 1
pm ET and last roughly until 4 pm ET, at which point the final
sliver of the moon will sneak past the sun and restart the clock
until 2045, when it will happen all over again.